In a bid to address the structural factors that observers have said contributed to 2022’s innovation economy labour shortage, industry group Digital Nova Scotia is spearheading a new information technology jobs training program across the four Atlantic provinces.

Skills for Hire, originally dubbed Skills for Success when the federal government announced it in August, will spend $3.7 million of federal money to offer 1,500 adults short term courses on data analytics and web development. Classes will start Jan. 30 with the help of St. John’s professional training company Bluedrop ISM, and applications are open now.

“Our Skills for Hire Atlantic program up-skills participants from across Atlantic Canada to prepare them for entry-level tech roles,” said Digital Nova Scotia CEO Wayne Sumarah in a statement.

“Leveraging transferable and valuable skills built through their own life experiences, this program provides technical and professional training opportunities to help program participants forge career paths into the exciting world that tech represents, while addressing the digital talent shortage many employers continue to face.”

The launch of the program comes as the immediate labour shortage shows early signs of easing. In November, data from Halifax early-stage venture capital fund Concrete Ventures showed that for the first time since General Partner Patrick Hankinson began keeping records, net job creation among the region’s innovation-driven companies fell to almost zero in the third quarter.

But innovation economy players like Vivian Beer, manager of HR strategy for the PEI BioAlliance, and Chandra Kavanagh, director of Bounce Health Innovation, have previously said the root cause of the shortage was a dearth of up-and-coming professionals in Atlantic Canada’s educational pipeline — a structural problem with the potential to outlive individual economic cycles.

In May, Beer and Kavanagh both said in interviews that one possible solution was upskilling programs for workers, in the vein of Skills for Hire. Beer and Kavanagh are life sciences specialists, but University of New Brunswick Faculty of Computer Science Dean Luigi Benedicenti said in July that the IT sector has faced similar structural issues, with private sector leaders asking his faculty to scale up dramatically.

The Skills for Hire courses will last 20 weeks, with classes being held virtually and participants being asked to commit at least 10 hours per week. Participation is free.